Cotton Candy On The Kittatinny ...

“The sky broke like an egg into full sunset and the water caught fire.”

                  ~ Pamela Hansford Johnson

                          ~ 1912-1981

The cotton candy, bubblegum pink of a winter sunset brushes the snow sugared Kittatinny Ridge, also called Blue Mountain, and reflects in the Lehigh River on a January evening along the Delaware and Lehigh National Heritage Corridor (D&L Trail) at Lehigh Gap.

In the shadow of the Kittatinny Ridge, the Lehigh Gap in Slatington, Pennsylvania, is a crossroads where the Lehigh Gap Nature Center’s trails connect two historic trails – the Appalachian Trail and the D&L Trail. 

The Appalachian Trail, a foot path, follows the ridge on both sides of the Lehigh Gap, running 1,245 miles south to Georgia and 930 miles north to Maine. Running from Wilkes-Barre to Bristol, the D&L Trail passes through the Lehigh and Delaware rivers and their canals in Pennsylvania.

Winter At The Ford ...

“One day I will find the right words, and they will be simple.”

                 ~ Jack Kerouac

                       ~ 1922-1969 

Winter’s quiet beauty paints a simple elegance in this high contrast monochrome shot I captured during a January sunset at the Ford of the Jordan Creek, one of my very favorite places to be and to photograph at Trexler Nature Preserve, Schnecksville, Pennsylvania.

Hawk's Winter Watch ...

“Adopt the pace of nature: her secret is patience.”

                ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

                      ~ 1803-1882 
Regal Red-Tailed Hawk peers from a high perch, gazing over the winter landscape in search of prey as sunset beckons on a February evening at Trexler Memorial Park, Allentown, Pennsylvania.

This bird of prey is the most common hawk in North America.

Background texture by Jai Johnson added for artistic effect.